bobzilla said:What's the elevation? An honest quesion because the wife has an affiction with altitude sickness (we got to see the med bay at the alpine visiors center. yay!)
Right about 5000'. To get to any other real population center (Denver, SLC, Vegas) you have to go over at least one 10,000' pass. It's my understanding that it's something you adapt to, so living here is different than undergoing an immediate altitude change.
IIRC, airplanes are pressurized to an equivalent of about 7-8,000'.
And for those who want to be involved in R&D - if you want to be, you can be. Everyone gets a chance to chime in and if you've got specific skills we'd love to take advantage of them. We also want you to be familiar with our products so there's a good employee discount and access to the FM cars.
I should note that being a CSR for a Miata toy shop is very different from being a counter person at a random repair shop. The big difference is that our customers are happy and excited to be spending money on fun things instead of angry and frustrated that they have to spend money just to fix what was working yesterday. Lots of "I'm trying to decide what suspension to use, here's what I do with my car" sorta stuff. I spent years doing this, it's not bad. The troubleshooting calls are a fun mental challenge, and you've got lots of resources to draw on from factory service manuals to people who have been doing this for decades.
Of course, you do get the occasional cranky person who has had a problem but they're the minority and we give our CSRs the tools they need to make that as easy as possible to sort out. The biggest problem our CSR team has to deal with is the sheer volume of contacts - but that's why we want to hire you.
Would love it! Wish I hasn't messed up the address test back in 2015 when I applied, didn't realize key mistakes that were fixed were penalized even if you got the address correct, doesn't make sense to me, but c'est la vie.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
Short periods about 8-10k she's ok with. Her problem was 6 days above 8k' with hiking. Alpine visitors center is almost 11k iirc. That was the straw that broke the camels back.
since she now has a c-pap at night and I don't thinknshed have the same problem but perception is the killer
z31maniac said:Would love it! Wish I hasn't messed up the address test back in 2015 when I applied, didn't realize key mistakes that were fixed were penalized even if you got the address correct, doesn't make sense to me, but c'est la vie.
Note that our previous HR person is no longer with us. She did a few things that didn't make sense IMO. Don't let that put you off applying again if you're interested.
Bobzilla, if you're seriously interested, you could always come out for a visit and see how she copes. There's quite a difference between living here and climbing/hiking above 10k. My wife struggled last time we climbed a 14k peak but can run and bike around here no problem.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
We will talk tonight. She's likely not going back after may. She's done teaching and she can get an IA job anywhere
I'd be all over this if, well, if I was inclined to live in the mountains, and if I had any marketable skills, well other than my extreme likeability and ability to courteously interact with people of all personality types and ideologies, and well, if I still worked.
Not that I'm qualified but I am curious what cost of living would be like.
A little less than the national average - so more than someplace like TN but less than someplace like CA. Like everywhere, we've got a seller's market for real estate at the moment and that gas price looks a little out of date - we're usually a bit lower than the national average fuel cost.
https://www.payscale.com/cost-of-living-calculator/Colorado-Grand-Junction
Keith Tanner said:We can teach Miata, especially if you have a troubleshooting sort of brain. And winter here is pretty darn pleasant - you can visit the snow, but you don't have to live in it. I haven't shoveled my driveway in years. Good time to relocate...well, that's something I can't fix :)
I'm great with general automotive performance stuff. Been doing that for 30 years. Just have next to zero Miata in my brain other than general repairs.
I'm sure that living in Palisade/Grand Junction is lovely. I've been there a few times. I've even eaten at Citrola's. I think if I move somewhere it will be less rural/isolated. PA is at least nearby to bigger cities.
I also just got two raises in three months. Not saying you can't afford me, but I have it pretty sweet here.
Nobody here is getting rich from working at FM. It's a good place to work, but it's not lucrative. Which is good, because it means that anyone who comes here to work comes here because they want to work at FM, not because FM made the highest offer. It could be why people stick around so long, I think our staff members have been here for an average of 8-9 years.
I'm not chasing anyone in particular. I know the successful applicant will be someone who figures out how to make it work, not why it won't work :) It's the first step in showing you have problem solving tendencies, I guess.
GJ is the biggest population center between Denver and SLC. It's about 4 hours to each of those. We've got about 100k people, but if you want big city life with loads of people, traffic, high density housing and poor air quality it's not the place to be :) That also means a smaller variety of restaurants, no nightclubs and no big name concerts other than the annual Rock Jam and Country Jam festivals. I grew up in a metro area of about a million, and I miss hearing all the different languages on the street. But I very much like it here.
Keith Tanner said:A little less than the national average - so more than someplace like TN but less than someplace like CA. Like everywhere, we've got a seller's market for real estate at the moment and that gas price looks a little out of date - we're usually a bit lower than the national average fuel cost.
https://www.payscale.com/cost-of-living-calculator/Colorado-Grand-Junction
Its almost exactly the same as here.
EDIT: Closest track?
If I was younger...
If I were single...
If I had no kids...
If I had customer service skills...
bobzilla said:Keith Tanner said:A little less than the national average - so more than someplace like TN but less than someplace like CA. Like everywhere, we've got a seller's market for real estate at the moment and that gas price looks a little out of date - we're usually a bit lower than the national average fuel cost.
https://www.payscale.com/cost-of-living-calculator/Colorado-Grand-Junction
Its almost exactly the same as here.
EDIT: Closest track?
The track they use for testing, which is in Grand Junction.
Keith Tanner said:z31maniac said:Would love it! Wish I hasn't messed up the address test back in 2015 when I applied, didn't realize key mistakes that were fixed were penalized even if you got the address correct, doesn't make sense to me, but c'est la vie.
Note that our previous HR person is no longer with us. She did a few things that didn't make sense IMO. Don't let that put you off applying again if you're interested.
Bobzilla, if you're seriously interested, you could always come out for a visit and see how she copes. There's quite a difference between living here and climbing/hiking above 10k. My wife struggled last time we climbed a 14k peak but can run and bike around here no problem.
Would love to. The pay cut would be tough, with the ladies auto-immune disease, anything less than the type of insurance I get working for one of the largest tech companies in the world wouldn't be affordable.
Streetwiseguy said:That sounds fabulous, other than the "talking to Miata enthusiasts all over the planet" part. Do you need a large, grumpy looking old guy to stand by the front door to scare people away?
Imagine large and grumpy with more law firm and collections experience. A cross between "Uncle Junior" Soprano and Mike from Breaking Bad.
You can pay me in cash, under the table, when nobody else is watching.
You know when you will need me.
Pick up the phone. I'm always home. Dirty deeds done dirt cheap. 
z31maniac said:bobzilla said:Keith Tanner said:A little less than the national average - so more than someplace like TN but less than someplace like CA. Like everywhere, we've got a seller's market for real estate at the moment and that gas price looks a little out of date - we're usually a bit lower than the national average fuel cost.
https://www.payscale.com/cost-of-living-calculator/Colorado-Grand-Junction
Its almost exactly the same as here.
EDIT: Closest track?
The track they use for testing, which is in Grand Junction.
Note that that's a go-kart track. It's plenty of fun (I've driven it at a couple of FM summer camps), but think of it as an oversized autocross with curbs and elevation changes rather than being a big race track.
I think the closest big track is probably either High Plains Raceway east of Denver or Utah Motorsports Campus (used to be Miller) west of SLC. Looks like just over 300 miles to both of them.
Could trade my house on the freeway in SoCal for something like this and work on the phone. Doubt you need a mechanical / automation fabrication engineer.
https://www.redfin.com/CO/Brighton/3740-E-144th-Ave-80602/home/63031753
I do!
But I don't exactly want to leave my current job either. Pay/Benefits are just too good.
Closest track is GJMS, which is a kart track. We have basically free access to it for testing, and there are time trial events every 6 weeks or so. You can also drop in and drive it pretty much anytime for a fee. Plus club kart racing if you need a W2W fix.
Big tracks are HPR near Denver, Pueblo Motorsports Park, Miller. The first two are about 5 hours away and are pretty accessible for track time.
Off-roading is world class. Moab is close by, mountains are close by, Jeeps everywhere.
Bump. We're still looking!
https://www.flyinmiata.com/default/about/jobs
- great company culture
- potential to join the employee coop and help steer the company
- potential to be involved in all areas of the company including R&D
- good employee discount
- stretch your troubleshooting chops
- season pass to the local track for R&D work and access to company vehicles for occasional pleasure use
- we love living here
I think Mike (our CSR head) may be willing to consider remote working for the right person, but you'll have to ask him about that. We definitely would prefer to have everyone in-house, as there's a lot of back and forth that's hard to replicate with technology.
C'mon people, don't make me keep posting videos of driving Miatas around our 'hood.
I'm gonna do it anyway. Here's the local track - I'm doing temperature torture testing on one of the NDs in the R&D fleet. This is about 10-15 minutes from the shop.
Blast from the past, here's the Targa Miata in four cylinder mode heading up one of the local back roads while was testing out an unusual spring setup. This is about 5 minutes from my house. They've smoothed out the worst of it but the fun roads around here are a little rowdier than things like Deal's Gap because the dirt is a little more mobile and the drop-offs are real. Takes a couple of minutes before I can let the car get on cam.
Fun track video. Some brief moments in 3rd gear. Sort a like a wide open autox course.
Not that there's anything wrong with it!
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